Blogs
ICT Manifestos of three largest political parties of Pakistan
I must make it clear right at the start that I am a completely non-political person, and so is this blog about the manifestos of political parties. I have honestly tried to be as objective as I could. It came about because these days in Pakistan the election campaigns are in full swing and all…
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Presenting USF at UNCTAD in Geneva
It was a truly remarkable event – no self-praise intended – with three of the world’s most successful ‘administrators’ of Universal Service Funds, from three continents, at one place, sharing what could be accomplished and what could be learned from the experiences. The occasion was 15th session of UNCTAD Commission on Science and Technology for…
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My first visit to Nigeria
The smart Nigerian lady Minister of Communications and IT, with a slight British accent, is a truly amazing person – something I witnessed during the 2-day “retreat” of Nigeria’s USPF (Universal Service Provisioning Fund). More about it after some backdrop. USPF Nigeria was established under the National Communications Act 2003 and has not been doing…
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Is broadband important for us?
When my wife showed this picture of a dress on her cellphone to her tailor (a greying middle-aged, semi-literate person with an unkempt appearance) asking him to have a good look at it as she wanted him to make something similar, he turned around and asked, “Baji, aap ke paas bluetooth hai”? (Sister, do you…
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NOTES FROM UKRAINE
FOR FOUR DAYS THAT I WAS IN UKRAINE THE MAXIMUM TEMP. WAS MINUS 2 C AND THANKS TO LANGUAGE ISSUE, “BREAKING THE ICE” WASN’T ALL THAT EASY EITHER! But two things I couldn’t help noticing. The first thing was that despite the huge differences between Ukraine and Pakistan, there are also striking similarities, especially in the…
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3G in Pakistan
AS A CONCERNED CITIZEN, I WOULD LIKE TO URGE ALL THOSE WHO HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE ICT SECTOR TO DO WHATEVER THEY CAN, TO PUSH AND EXPEDITE INTRODUCTION OF MOBILE BROADBAND (3G OR WHATEVER) . I say this because yet another delay (albeit short and for good reasons) has appeared. New generation is…
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Broadband affordability
IT WAS QUITE A HORROR-STORY WHEN SOMEONE THOUGHT THAT JUST LOWERING BROADBAND TARIFFS WOULD MAKE THE PEOPLE FLOCK BUT FORGOT SOMETHING… USF had just started the Broadband project where the criterion for getting subsidy was to prove to the Technical Auditors that the target number of broadband connections were actually working. The idea behind this…
Read MoreAs 2011 Comes to a Close…
AS 2011 COMES TO A CLOSE I THOUGHT I SHOULD HAVE A LAST LOOK AT MY TIME WITH USF (Universal Service Fund) Pakistan! Not that I will scratch it from my memory after this, but fact is that I won’t have much to say about it, except always wishing USF lots and lots of success.It…
Read MoreBroadband for unserved areas – innovative bidding by USF Pakistan
THE THING THAT INTERESTS OTHER COUNTRIES MOST IN USF PAKISTAN, IS OUR INNOVATIVE BROADBAND PROGRAM! Even this month (Oct. 2011) I will be conducting an ITU sponsored workshop on this topic in Thailand. Designing the program was rather arduous. Initially we thought we would conduct standard auctions for Broadband too, just like the Rural Telecom…
Read More“Corruption in USF”
ONE OF THE BIGGEST CHALLENGES I face is to convince some of those who matter that it is possible to deal in Billions WITHOUT ANY CORRUPTION. I don’t blame them. Corruption has become so pervasive that if and when it is absent, one tends to disbelieve! So what does one do? It is said that…
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